H.R. 3012 would amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to eliminate the per-country numerical limitation for employment-based immigrants, to increase the per-country numerical limitation for family-sponsored immigrants.

== Detailed Summary ==

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== Points in Favor ==

1. Country of Birth has no place in skills-based immigration. There is a diversity visa
category for that which explicitly disallows China, India etc...

2. America is the LAND OF THE FREE, HOME OF THE BRAVE. Expecting an employees loyalty for
2-3 years in exchange for sponsorship is one thing. Expecting the same for 20-30 years is
only a shade away from indentured servitude and downright slavery. It is not who we are !

3. America needs these High-skilled Immigrants as much as they need us. We need the tax dollars to pay for our retirement, social security, medicare and medicaid. If the majority
of these immigrants are from China and India - these are fast growing MAJOR economies. many
of them can do just as well back home. when that happens AMERICA LOSES.

4. It is time we stopped treating the legal tax-paying immigrants worse than we treat illegal immigrants! These people make an important contribution to society and america - Think Jerry Yang Sergey Brin etc...

5. These immigrants are not jobs takers, they are job creaters. Once they get their green card they will open up new businesses and will create more jobs buby doing more business. Check the history of americaAmerica - allAll these immigrants were creating and doing businesses as they all are business savvy.

6. Country like portugal (smaller in size) gets same number of visa as country like China, Maxico, India (larger in size), Those big size country need bigger amount of numbers....So it will create same opportunity to all people same regardless country and borders....

== Points Against ==

1. Provides a small relief to backlog (a few years from decades) for India, China, and other countries in the bill while significantly increasing the wait time for the rest of the world.

2. All unused green card numbers from other countries' quotas are already allocated to the countries that are over their quota, each year.

3. Has nothing to do with fairness. Immigration is a privilege, not a birthright, US can institute policies on immigration that it deems beneficial to its interests. While it can be argued that having more highly skilled immigrants is in the best interest of the country, it cannot be logically argued that having more skilled immigrants from India, China, or Mexico will be MORE beneficial to US compared to immigrants from other countries. The selection process to determine the "high" skill of the applicants is same for all applicants regardless of their country of origin. The reason for the per country limit was to keep diversity in Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics fields and to encourage immigrants from smaller countries to become permanent residents as well rather than having individuals from one or few countries dominate the STEM

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Costs: $0.00 per and increases their $162,301.27 share of the national debt by $0.00.(source info)

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To What Comittee was this Bill Referred?

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Visitor Comments

Jose Guitierrez

And the best part is this DOES NOT increase any immigration, just being fair to folks who came here first, overriding an archaic and discriminating quota by country of origin, which would make sense for Family based, but is obsolete for Employment based. There are folks waiting already for 13 years, and who start now, may have to wait for upto 70 years.

Dandi

An Immigrant

This bill is all about fairness. They are just asking for first come first serve. This will not change the diversity of this great nation built by immigrants. People from all around the world apply for green card and not just people from India!

Immigrant

Legal Immigrants promote the economy of United States. We buy houses; spend money on cars; restaurants; Small Business; Buy small business; work hard based on our EDUCATION. Support this BILL. Fairness should be DONE

Skilled Immigrant

Employment based immigration should only be based upon merit and not diversity. Also, the current law doesn't really achieve the diversity anyways. It's common sense that first-come-first-serve is the only fair thing to do.

Waiting to be Green

This bill is all about Fairness. no doubt. I am here since 10 years paying my taxes and dues. still waiting for green card. Where as the lottery system giving away 65000 visas a year. And none of em paid even a single dollar in past 10 years.

I support this bill because this is designed for real immigrants.

Waitingforever

It is all about fairness. USA is a land of Immigrants. Legal Immigrants pay their fair share of taxes, contribute to the economic system of this country and yet are given the boot when it comes to legal immigration.

On the contrary, all talks are aimed at illegal immigration and granting of asylum to people who are in the country illegally.

Why this indifference????

groove

A lot of hard working immigrant are not only helping the local economies, but are also helping corporates compete in the new economy. It's only fair to give them a chance to get a green card in some real reasonable time frame. We are not realizing that today the US's main strength is in services and technology. And we are already loosing out to other nations with more favorable immigration policies - like Australia, Canada, Singapore, Malaysia. If we continue with the the current policies the 'brain drain' will only escalate and will hurt us more in the long run. Support this bill to be fair and to protect intellect. We need it.

Facts

This bill is meant for people who are already here in high tech or medical research jobs possibly more than a decade & their green card cases are sitting PRE APPROVED but can't be adjudicated due to lack of visa numbers.

Secondly such people enter in this country using H1b visas not green cards directly & there are no country limits on H1b visas.

Thirdly why should one country have a preference over the other? If Europeons & Africans don't want to come here or don't have skills, why should Indians & Chinese get green cards after their death?

As far as diversity is concerned, this is all about merit or first come first served. Who is stopping people from other countries to come here if they are skilled. Get in the same line. Fact is no one else produces enough engineers & doctors to spare a few for US.

Facts

By the way, we are the people least likely to avail any welfare (although we contribute in social security & medicare etc without any expectation for anything in return) as against your diversity visa winners who need welfare from day one & some need throughout their life times.

In a decade or two, Indians & Chinese won't need to come to US anyway (highly qualified already don't want to). You're doing more harm to your own interests by opposing this bill.

Desi_MS

I'll buy a house within weeks of getting my Green Card- This bill would expedite me getting the GC. We are also thinking of starting a private school (kumon) with my wife and her friend, but can't do it without the GC. I think we are a positive addition to the society and can't imagine why US citizens would loose by us getting the GC.

Nat

I agree with hernandez. if you are qualified, why do you have to wait for ever to get your Green Card, despite living in the US legally and paying all taxes? this Green Card is not going to cause any one to lose their jobs or home !!

Rennie Allen

I have been living in the US, since 1998. I applied for LPR in 2006, my application to adjust status was received by the Nebraska Service Center in July 2007.

My son (currently 14, and who was 1 year old when he arrived in the US) is currently working his tail off (attending a private preparatory school) to develop the prerequisites that would allow him to apply to the Air Force Academy, where he hopes to study to become a fighter pilot in the US Air Force.

If this legislation passes, not only will this dream of his be destroyed, but due to the delays in my application, he will "age-out" and be forced to leave the United States. I effect, it will destroy his life, before he even gets a chance to start.

Any policy that could result in such a travesty of justice, cannot possibly be fair. This legislation must be defeated.

DacadeWait

Forget about India or China or whatever race/religion etc but which part does not make sense about fairness when it comes to "First Come First Serve". Whatever country one is from but if they are waiting because of country quota limit it is not fair and that is all this Bill is about. Please do not be selfish and vote YES for this Bill.

aE

I support H.R. 3012: Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act because it is unfair for people who have been legally working and leaving in U.S. for over 10 years to wait another decade to get their U.S. permanent residency while some other people who came to U.S. very recently as 2009 are allowed to get U.S. permanent residency. How can people who pay tax, contribute to the social security, and has been serving U.S over a decade get lesser preference over someone who just came over to U.S.? Most importantly this bill does not change the overall immigration numbers. This bill only fixes an injustice by allocating skilled immigration visas on a first come first serve bases instead of a quota system.

Republican Raja

This is a bill that benefits Indians at the expense of every other nationality. If the shoe was on the other foot, not a single Indian would support it and all this high minded talk about fairness, or discrimination. is just so much chin music. Indians are already for about half of all EB visas right now despite so called per country limits, and apparently they would like all of them. The real problem here is not enough visas but too many Indians.

TimW

Does anyone really know how EASY the US makes it to become a citizen in the US? Do a little research and see how our neighbors in Canada and Mexico and then check a few other "friendly" nations like France, Germany, the UK, Japan, and even China. You would be surprised considering the amount of attention the US gets from the world. Americans should be pretty proud of their willingness to open their doors and pocketbooks to all other world inhabitants. BTW, did you know you cannot become a Canadian citizen unless you speak English or French? Pretty hard-lined if you ask me. Guess the PM wouldn't like it in LA or San Antonio! New York must scare the hell out of Canadians!

An immigrant worker who is not Indian or Chinese

This bill will benefit immigrant workers from India and China only while making everybody else wait longer. When starting the long application process everybody knew what the rules were. Now this bill would change the rules to favor a certain group.

VOTE NO.

sm

I studied computer science in an American university and there were less than half dozen US citizens in my class of approx 100 students. The majority were from India and China. We have to remain competitive by letting the high skilled immigrants remain in the USA, otherwise corporations will gladly outsource tech jobs to other countries, thereby losing educated high tax paying and high spending immigrants.

sm

However, to answer your question, Indian consulting companies hire Indian immigrants to exploit them by taking advantage of the archaic immigration laws and inefficient bureaucracy. Due to the system taking 30 yrs to provide a green card to a high skilled immgirant from India/China and the immigration laws preventing high skilled immigrants to change employers/jobs while their GC is being processed, the immigrants become like "bonded labor" to these Indian consulting companies. The high skilled workers have to remain with these employers till the US govt gives the high skilled worker their "freedom" with a GC (after decades of waiting in line legally).

This bill will make high skilled immigration fair by making it first-come-first-served.

techguy

truth2011

Vote YES ! If is unfair to ask highly skilled foreigners who have Phds and Master degrees to wait for 20 years when they are working hard to improve the economy and make businesses prosper. It shouldnt matter where you are from, what matters is what contribution can you make to this country !.

samuel

The people concerned are already in United States working for different Corporations around United States. So there is no question of changing diversity.

They are highly paid and receive high salaries based on merit and hard work. Most of them are in the highly taxed bracket and pay taxes diligently.

Most of them have high bank balances and zero credit card balances. Some of them are sending money to their home country as they cannot invest in business in United States. A few of them bought homes; but the other majority are waiting to get a green card so that they buy a home. They have more than 20% down payment as cash to buy a home.

They cannot change jobs till they get Green Card.

Some of them are moving back to their home country as they have better opportunities there. Some moved out to their home country to start their own business. Some applied for Canada immigration and moved to Canada.

So VOTE YES for this fairness bill.

Sagar

HR 3012 will promote fairness in the Employment-Based Green Card system by making it a true first-come-first-serve process. The Per-Country limits do not make sense in the Employment-Based Green card system. This Bill will fix that problem which is currently affecting the lives of half a million people stuck in the backlog.

nb

justsaying

Existing system penalizes legal, high-skilled applicants from certain countries. Today it affects applicants from India and China (wait times measured in decades); in the future it could as easily affect applicants from Australia, England or wherever - simply based on the number of applicants from that country.

First come first served. Every applicant waits for their turn - irrespective of their nationality. That is what this bill does. It does not impact the make of the applicant pool, the adjudication decisions, etc. All it does is restore and ensure fairness in the system.

gs1968

Lots of good points both for and against the bill but may have already headed for cold storage.Next week there are no markup sessions on the House Judiciary Committee and on both 10/25 and 10/26-the judiciary committee has scheduled hearings on other bills.

Temp_Worker

This bill is advantageous not to India or China but essentially to the United states.

Skilled work will move to where the skilled workers are. Not passing this now will reverse the brain drain that created the innovation capital that is silicon valey. Its already happenning. The competitiveness of the US is at risk.

Those who think that it gives India or China an advantage, think again.

Each skilled worker that is going to make US a permanent home invests in the US economy (Buys a home, invests capital in secondary and primary markets, many start companies that add US workers and even if they don't, just buying a home means creating construction jobs in the US). The US is getting well educated workers in areas where there is excessive demand without having to have invested a penny in them from birth. The aging population is getting a free funding source for social security and retirement.

Support this bill if not for anything else but for your country - the USA

Ram Kumar

Ramsey

This is unrelated to this bill, but US cities are dying of age and need of new entrants, it needs to rejuvenate like Canada & Australia, open up immigration. This bill is only about fairness, it's not about bringing new people, it's just about giving something to somebody who asked first. How is that unfair by any standards ? If there were more Indians here before the SriLankans, why should they be ill treated just because there are less number of SriLankans ?

Sharma

The people concerned are already in United States working for different Corporations around United States. So there is no question of changing diversity.

They are highly paid and receive high salaries based on merit and hard work. Most of them are in the highly taxed bracket and pay taxes diligently.

Most of them have high bank balances and zero credit card balances. Some of them are sending money to their home country as they cannot invest in business in United States. A few of them bought homes; but the other majority are waiting to get a green card so that they buy a home. They have more than 20% down payment as cash to buy a home.

They cannot change jobs till they get Green Card.

Some of them are moving back to their home country as they have better opportunities there. Some moved out to their home country to start their own business. Some applied for Canada immigration and moved to Canada.

hope567

this is for fairness to high skilled immigrants who have been in a state of limbo for years and are unable to move forward with their lives. Hundreds of thousands of legal immigrants are waiting on the sidelines, unable to forge strong connections with the American economy by purchasing homes, opening businesses some of which could potentially create hundreds of jobs

YES YES and YES to FAIRNES

Imagine this - You are at the grocery store, trying to buy food to put on your family's table.

Now the manager at the grocery store decides to put you in a separate line just because you are from a community that brings in a lot of customers from. He just hates the fact that there are lot of shoppers from your neck of the wood - which is true but not fair.

Now what happens? This line from your community is super long, you are stuck in this loong line. You cannot a break!

What is happening here? You and people from your community are...and what about the Store? Yes the store is definitely suffering too. If these customers were treated fairly, they would have shopped more, made more purchases, everyone would have been happy. Mind you these customers are not Theives, they are benefitting that grocery store and hence its economy!

This is excatly the same hard scenario these skilled immigrants are going through and we need bring in justice and give them a FAIR chance. DEFINITE YES!!

To Rennie Allen

Have you given any thought to about a million people going through your situation? because they cannot even apply for adjustment of status (which you could)??

Do you mean to say that bringing fairness to the system will jeopardize your child's future, hence you oppose it?...well guess what, the number of people and their children suffering from this inequality, who lives are in jeopardy already far far outnumber you.

EQUALITY should be based on your HARDWORK and skillset and NOT based on your skin/nationality.

HR3012

Alexei.. This bill is about Fairness. It applies to people who have applied for green card and approved up to a certain stage. This will clear the backlogs and let them get their green card faster. This will remove this big uncertainty in their lives. 15-20 years of uncertainty during your prime productive age is surely not good. Having National Origin as a criteria for approving Green card surely should not be a policy in America. Hope you understand. Thanks you.

BK

To Rennie Allen

That being said, do you understand what fairness means? How in God’s name is First Come First Serve not fair to you!!! Do you even realize that your problem is mostly because of your delay in applying for LPR! You came to this country when your son was 1 year old in 1998 and you applied for LPR in 2006 when you son was almost 9 years old. I am sorry to say this but, you snooze you lose!

I came to this country in 2001 and applied for LPR in 2002. My son was 4 years old then and he is 14 years now. What about my son's dreams?

bobbywashere

This Bill changes the rules that EVERYONE who entered the game signed up for. Do not change the rules mid-game. This bill favors one country, being India (China does not benefit from this bill) at the expense of ALL others.

VOTE NO ON THIS BILL! People talke about the "fairness" of it, how fair is it to change the rules mid-game?? If anything, this bill, if passed, should only apply to new applicants - ie. those not already in line.